Gossip Cicchetti

Such great pizza and authentic Italian food - (and I’ve lived in Italy and now live in London - so have eaten my fair share over the years!) and lovely warm service at Gossip. The burrata mozeralla salads are awesome - the pizza’s are traditional thin crust with perfect amounts of topping - juicy and crispy all at once - top notch! We had a large family group of 9 with two young children and we all ate at the same time and had very attentive service to make it a lovely family evening - Italian style! Quality food fairly priced - get yourself to Gossip Penn Hill if you’re in and around the area! Thanks 🙏🏼!!

Myself, wife and daughter went out to celebrate my wife’s birthday last night at Gossip, Penn Hill. I’ve never been, even though have lived locally for over a decade! Boy have I been missing out on some amazing Italian food! The cicchetti (tapas style sharing dishes) meant you could sample all your favourite dishes in one meal… so we had calamari, veal, oven baked aubergine with cheese and sauce (amazing), mussels etc and my kid had pizza. The wine was good quality not seen in the supermarkets and the service from the fabulous Maddy was really attentive, polite and friendly, you can’t ask for more than that really. They even heard us talking about my wife’s birthday and gave her a surprise celebration! Service really makes a place and makes you want to come back and recommend to others. Recently we had poor service in a certain local marina café restaurant and have decided to venture to new places, this one is a gem! Penn Hill is decent and has a lot more potential too.

So, we couldn’t decide what to cook for dinner so decided to just head here and give it a try and pasta / pizza was appealing to us, upon entering we were greeted warmly and asked if we had ever been there before, we hadn’t, and the gentleman said he thought so as he hadn’t seen us before, this made us feel so comfortable instantly as it gave a sense that they get a lot of regulars, so it must be good, and yes… it was more than good! The décor is modern yet rustic and comforting with great music playing, the ambience was spot on. Upon being presented with menus everything was explained to us and we were given advice on the draft beer available and a wine list. To start we ordered a large glass of Exhibition Rosé – it was crisp and fresh with just the right level of acidity and my fiancé had a pint of San Miguel, you can’t go wrong there, as well as Calamari Fritti and the olives & bread board, both were very tasty, light batter on the calamari and a good quality balsamic with the bread. For mains my fiancé had Spaghetti Carbonara, with an egg yolk on top, and I had a Prosciutto E Fungi pizza – both were full of flavour, lots of topping on the pizza and plentiful pancetta in the pasta, the addition of a mini pizza wheel to help cut was a great touch and I added chilli oil, which from the look of it was made in-house and had a subtle warmth to it. Time for dessert, all of which are homemade… Chocolate Almond Cake with a Brandy Sauce and Tiramisu, we were eating Italian after all… both were delicious, you could tell they were homemade, portions were big and full of flavour, the Tiramisu was some of the best I’ve had, all washed down with a double espresso each… yum. Service was spot on, attentive and warm but not overbearing in any way and everything was well priced. Service was not added to the final bill and I felt awful as there was no option on the card machine to add gratuity and I don’t carry cash, if the owners / staff are reading this, I’m sorry! I will be making up for this when we return, which will be soon!

Thoroughly enjoyed our first visit to Gossip at Penn Hill. We booked an early table so was very quiet when we first arrived but soon started to fill up. It was very hospitable and welcoming. Great menu and we really enjoyed our meals. Hubby had his usual swag bog and I tried the pappardelle with lamb which was delicious. I usually have ice cream desert but went mad and had gnocchi with nutella, strawberries and white chocolate and it scrumptious and spangly not over sweet.We will certainly be going back in the very near future.

The misses and I went here for date night and it was perfect! We had 6 smaller tapas style dishes between us which was the perfect amount for 2, as well as a beautiful bottle of wine. Followed by 2 deserts I was expecting to have to take out a loan to pay for it but I was pleasantly surprised. Delicious food and not overpriced! Will definitely be visiting more often - I want to try some of the full size mains.